LOCKWOOD, ANTHONY, naval officer, hydrographer, surveyor, office holder, and politician; b. c. 1775 in England; he had one son, also named Anthony, who was born in 1804; m. 11 May 1819 Mrs Harriet Lee of Saint John, N.B.; buried 25 Jan. 1855 in Stepney (London), England.

Anthony Lockwood joined the Royal Navy in 1791, holding the ranks of midshipman and master’s mate before being made a master of the Jason, on which he served from 20 May 1797 to 25 Feb. 1799. He was master of the Crescent between 25 April 1799 and 26 July 1801, during which time he surveyed Curaçao and part of the Spanish Main. Illness then interrupted his naval career until July 1804, but over the next two years he conducted surveys of Cap Ferrat, France, La Coruña, Spain, and Falmouth harbour, England, as well as making an incomplete survey of the Channel Islands.

On 1 July 1807 Lockwood was appointed acting master attendant at the naval yard in Bridgetown, Barbados, by Vice-Admiral Sir Alexander Forrester Inglis Cochrane. He retained this position until the beginning of 1814, when he commenced surveys on the coasts of British North America. During the next four years, sailing the sloop Examiner and based near Halifax, Lockwood made extensive marine surveys of Nova Scotia and Grand Manan Island, N.B., in addition to producing a chart of the Saint John harbour. His last Admiralty chart was certified at the Hydrographic Office in London on 25 March 1818.

Seeking post-war preferment, in 1818 Lockwood published in London, at his own expense, A brief description of Nova Scotia, with plates of the principal harbors, which contained fulsome dedications to the lieutenant governor of the colony, Lord Dalhousie [Ramsay*], and officers of its government, especially Surveyor General Charles Morris*, who had already employed Lockwood as a map-maker. On 25 Feb. 1819, with the written support of Commander Charles Bullen, Lockwood petitioned the colonial secretary, Lord Bathurst, for the position of surveyor general of New Brunswick. Seven weeks earlier, however, Lieutenant Governor George Stracey Smyth* had recommended George Shore, then acting surveyor general, for the appointment. Receiving no reply, Smyth confirmed his recommendation by letter to Bathurst dated 25 March. This, too, Bathurst ignored, appointing Lockwood on 23 April 1819 – a fact unknown to Smyth until Lockwood presented himself in Fredericton that July.

While passing through Saint John en route, Lockwood had encountered a shipload of Welsh emigrants from the snow Albion, for whom he issued location tickets on his arrival in the capital. This action, taken even before he had introduced himself to Smyth and his Council, proved to be a significant initiative in forming settlement policy in New Brunswick. By August, Lockwood had assisted in founding the Cardigan Society, to aid the Welsh settlement of that name; it was in turn quickly absorbed by the Fredericton Emigrant Society of which he became secretary.

Lockwood’s exertions during his first months in New Brunswick were impressive. Before taking his oath for the Council, which he automatically joined as surveyor general, he had written to Bathurst advising that the province be surveyed into sections. He took his place on the Council on 13 October, and found time that same fall to conduct the first survey of a canal route through the Chignecto Isthmus, which evidently won him valuable support among the Saint John merchants. On 16 December he proposed to the Council that he run a new survey of the boundaries of Kings, Queens, and Westmorland counties. During 1820 he surveyed 84 lots for emigrants on Cape Tormentine and built them a road to the Gaspereau River, as well as surveying another road between the Nerepis and Oromocto rivers. On 22 July of that year the Council heard Lockwood’s report on a land grant to the Micmac band on the Richibucto River. He submitted recommendations for further emigrant lots in Shepody Road at the Council meeting on 5 October.

After such a vigorous introduction, Lockwood apparently withdrew into the routine conduct of his office, though by June 1822, it appears, he was appointed receiver general of casual revenues in addition to the post he already held. Perhaps his periods of frantic activity followed by ones of relative inactivity were ominous. In the early fall of 1822 Lockwood first consulted Dr Thomas Emerson* of Fredericton and then received treatment from Dr Thomas Paddock of Saint John for mental illness of some sort. He had recovered sufficiently, nevertheless, to attend nine meetings of the Council between 18 Jan. and 13 March 1823, on the latter occasion presenting a plan of the Richibucto River, which displayed town reserves, and another for the Buctouche River. However, the political crisis following Lieutenant Governor Smyth’s death on 27 March provided the occasion, if not the inducement, for Lockwood’s spectacular descent into madness.

An interim president of the Council being required, George Leonard*, the octogenarian senior member, was first offered the position, which he declined on the grounds of age. Despite a challenge by supporters of Christopher Billopp, Ward Chipman* assumed the post of administrator on 1 April. The challenges continued however. Lockwood attended the Council meetings on 30 April and on 1 May. Thereafter he absented himself and for the next few weeks his whereabouts are uncertain. By 24 May he had persuaded Leonard to assert his right to the presidency “in the hope that it would produce tranquillity in the province.” Ostensibly to assist in that purpose, Lockwood appointed himself as Leonard’s civil aide-de-camp and inspecting field officer, as well as acting secretary. On 25 May he attempted to disseminate Leonard’s proclamation in Saint John – while at the same time writing a letter to Chipman offering terms for his, Lockwood’s, support. From 25 to 30 May Lockwood behaved with erratic violence in Saint John: issuing threats, brawling, taking up residence in Government House, and gathering an appreciative mob. Dr Paddock attended him with scant success. By the time he returned to Fredericton on 30 May, Lockwood was approaching collapse; on the steamboat General Smyth he scribbled a desperate note to Chipman requesting release from his present public offices since his “ailment” was “subject to increase from confinement.”

The Council considered Lockwood’s state of mind at their meeting on 31 May, hearing depositions from the doctors who had treated him and from the mayor of Saint John. The following day Lockwood set up a table in Fredericton square, at which he drank coffee, issued proclamations, and reacted pugnaciously to the crowd, before taking horse and riding about the streets firing pistols and declaring himself called to assume the government of the province. By nightfall Lockwood had been arrested and placed in the Fredericton jail. The Council received further evidence from the sheriff of York County on 2 June and were “fully satisfied” of Lockwood’s derangement. Chipman appointed a commission de lunatico inquirendo that day and by 5 June it had determined that Lockwood was legally mad, and had been since 19 May. On 7 June his wife and son petitioned for a committee of custody over his person and estate, which was immediately granted.

When George Shore, Lockwood’s replacement, examined the surveyor general’s office, he found confusion, mutilated documents, and disarray which would take “two extra employees five years to straighten out.” Furthermore, the discrepancy between Lockwood’s receipts as receiver general and the office’s bank deposit amounted to more than £2,000. Although he was moved from the jail to what was, in effect, house-arrest in September, Lockwood and his family had to suffer the public sale of his real and personal estate as the custodial committee sought to recover the missing public monies.

Throughout his confinement Lockwood petitioned for his liberty. But it was not until 10 Nov. 1825 that a further commission of inquiry, appointed by Lieutenant Governor Sir Howard Douglas*, declared him “restored to his understanding.” Soon after his release he returned with his wife to England, where he continued to receive a £150 annual pension from the government of’ New Brunswick until his death. Anthony Lockwood’s respite from suffering was only brief. “At times subject to fits of insanity” until 1836, he probably spent some of the last years of his life in the Bethnal Green Lunatic Asylum in London.

Peter Thomas